Dr. Thomas Piechota brings over 20 years of experience as an engineer, educator, and academic leader. He is currently a Professor in both the Dale E. and Sarah Ann Fowler School of Engineering and the Schmid College of Science and Technology at Chapman University. From 2016 to 2021, he served as Vice President for Research at Chapman, and from 2023 to 2025, he was Interim Dean of the Fowler School of Engineering.

Before joining Chapman, Dr. Piechota spent 16 years at the University of Nevada, Las Vegas, where he was a Professor of Civil and Environmental Engineering and Vice President for Research. His work has been widely recognized for advancing teaching and research in water resources, hydrology, and climate change, as well as for his leadership in building research capacity at the institutional level.

Dr. Piechota received the National Science Foundation CAREER Award for his project Improved Hydrologic Drought Forecasting Using Climate Information. He also served as Co-Investigator on a $20 million NSF study examining climate change impacts in Nevada and was an invited Lead Author of the Southwest Chapter of the 2013 National Climate Assessment.

He is a Fellow of the American Society of Civil Engineers and a licensed Civil Engineer in California.